Covered in prayer shawls, ultra-Orthodox Jewish men pray during the holiday of Sukkot, as one worshipper holds an etrog at the Western Wall, the holiest site where Jews can pray in Jerusalem’s Old City, Sunday, Oct. 12, 2014. According to Jewish tradition, Jews are commanded to bind together a palm frond, or “lulav,” with two other branches, along with an “etrog,” a lemon-like citrus fruit, that make up the “four species” used in holiday rituals. (AP Photo/Sebastian Scheiner)

The alarming success ISIS has had in conquering territory in the Iraq and Syria coupled with our current inability to confront or hold them back is deeply troubling.

Early this year, many of us watched in horror as ISIS carried out acts of unspeakable evil and posted them to Facebook and other social media sites. Many of us asked why the United States government was silent when it came to this horrific group. We were alarmed when State Department statements and briefing papers made no mention of this threat.

While Israel was fighting a war against Hamas early in the summer the Obama administration and the rest of the “civilized” world were busy condemning Israel for excessive force, while they were silent about the barbarism of ISIS.

President Obama now wants us to believe that while those of us with a Facebook account were aware of what ISIS was doing, the U.S. intelligence community was not. It seems to me that there is more to it then that: This was a case of willful ignorance and that ignorance continues to this day.

This article is not meant to be an attack on the president of the United States, and neither am I a partisan, but this administration has made some critical errors that has led directly to the frightening situation we currently find ourselves in. Worst of all, however, it is unaware that is it is making these mistakes and thus continues to make them. To be clear, the logic that leaving the Iraqis to their own devices will force them to defend their country against radicals like ISIS is flawed.

Here is why: Subservient societies do not easily transition to become autonomous. Freedom is not just a state of being, it is a state of mind. One can be physically free yet mentally enslaved. One cannot just take societies that have been enslaved to a dictator for centuries and give them democracy in the belief that freedom will reign and that the newly liberated society will put their lives on the line to defend their liberties.

The Biblical story of liberation is instructive here. According to the Biblical account it took 10 miraculous plagues and the splitting of a sea for the Israelites to be freed from Egyptian slavery. But that was not the end of the saga. The Israelites then spent 40 years in the desert before the transition from slaves to free people was complete.

What scholars call “civil religion” was much on display during the second Obama inauguration. It is argued that such civil religion is very important for the common good of the nation, but it can also become a threat to that common good. It can legitimize corruption and abuses even as it impedes critical discussion and debate about them.

America’s “civil religion” was on parade at the inauguration – in the music, the invocations and benedictions, and repeated references to God and faith and hope in almost every speech. Perhaps even more, the joyful yet reverent spirit of the crowd embodied and affirmed civil religion – even as it brought together citizens from diverse religions and people of no religious belief.

The idea that nations have a civic “religion” is central to most classical political philosophy. It more recently became the subject of academic controversy in response to sociologist Robert Bellah’s now classic 1967 essay, “Civil Religion in America,” and his subsequent book. “The Broken Covenant: American Civil Religion in Time of Trial (1975).” Bellah later told me that by the mid-1980s he’d stopped using the term “civil religion” because it was too often misunderstood. But he never stopped affirming the reality which becomes so evident on public occasions like inaugurations.

Though some speakers at the inauguration invoked the name of Jesus and oaths were sworn on the Jewish-Christian Bible, the civil religion of which Bellah wrote is neither Christian nor Jewish. Nor is it Muslim, Buddhist, Native American, or the faith of any other formal religious tradition, though it probably could not be sustained without their contributions to the fabric of American society and politics.

Civil religion, in other words, is not an explicitly religious faith as the term “religion” is usually understood. For it can, indeed must, be shared by people of many religions and by non-religious people. It essentially involves a deep and shared trust in the fundamental good of the nation, faith in its general purposes and a sense that a larger or “sacred” power both guides and judges those purposes. As such it not only allows for major religious differences within the nation, but also for strong disagreements about specific politics and programs.

Civil religion constitutes, in one famous image, a “sacred canopy” over the life of a nation that gives important sacral legitimation to national purpose and practice. Yet, like all forms of faith, it can at once affirm and legitimize many good things, but also things not so good. Indeed, it can even bless serious evils and thereby protect them from vigorous scrutiny and criticism. It can thereby also distort the practice and beliefs of the traditional religions.

That latter problem (the subversion of traditional religion to serve dubious and even evil national policies and programs) has always been a serious concern for thoughtful religious leaders.

While campaigning for the Democratic presidential nomination, President Barack Obama famously remarked on “bitter” blue-collar Pennsylvanians who “cling to guns or religion.”

Now Obama, in the wake of the mass murder of schoolchildren at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut a month ago, is exploring tighter gun restrictions. Gun control proponents already have introduced bills in the new Congress.

One generally conservative group, evangelical pastors largely agree (73 percent) that more regulation is needed, according to the December Evangelical Leaders Survey by the National Association of Evangelicals.

“The evangelical leaders who responded to the NAE survey support the Second Amendment right to bear arms, but also want our laws to prevent the slaughter of children,” said NAE president Leith Anderson.

Public support for tighter gun laws has grown since the Newtown shooting, with 58 percent backing tougher restrictions, according to a recent USA Today/Gallup poll. That’s up from 43 percent in October 2011.

“Most of my experience with guns has been as a hunter in the great Wisconsin outdoors,” said Bill Lenz, senior pastor of Christ the Rock Community Church. “I do not believe that guns are the heart of the problem, but there should be strong regulations on who can bear arms. The easy access to guns has undoubtedly contributed to horrible tragedies.”

There are many approaches to take, Lenz said, and gun control is one of them.

The NAE reports that the 27 percent of evangelical leaders who don’t supported tighter controls said there are better solutions to the problem of gun violence — better enforcement of existing gun laws, reform of the mental health system, regulation of media violence and “spiritual renewal.”

Cardinal Timothy Dolan, of New York, president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, speaks at the conference's annual fall meeting in Baltimore, Monday, Nov. 12, 2012.

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops is holding its annual conference this week in Baltimore, and many in the pews are wondering if there’s any soul searching about the thumping their political positions took at the polls last week.

President Barack Obama was re-elected, despite the bishops’ wading deep into partisan politics to “guide” Catholics and other Christian voters away from him — even launching their own “Fortnight of Freedom” political campaign in opposition to his Obamacare. Not only will Obama’s Health and Human Services mandate that employers offer coverage of contraception move forward, but he will appoint any new Supreme Court justices for the next four years. Roe v. Wade remains the law of the land for the foreseeable future. And, on top of this, every state vote on same-sex marriage went to the gay activists.

The mayor of New York City, Michael Bloomberg, endorsed Barack Obama for president, saying: “Our climate is changing … this week’s devastation … should compel all elected leaders to take immediate action.” Bloomberg added that, “Over the past four years, President Barack Obama has taken major steps to reduce our carbon consumption.” Thus, according to Bloomberg, Obama is the best guy to deal with climate change and thus prevent future devastating floods and hurricanes.

Then we have the religious right, which is questioning why God brought the hurricane upon the U.S. There have been some rabbis in Israel who have indicated that the U.S. deserved this hurricane. Both of these approaches have something in common: They are based on faith.

Whenever something good or bad happens we humans have a need to try and make sense of it. We ask: Why have I been blessed in this way? Or, why has this terrible thing happened to me?

Both religion and science try and answer some of these questions for us. Religion often makes the mistake of saying that the answers to these questions are facts when they are nothing more than articles of faith. But many secular people are guilty of exactly the same thing. Hurricane Sandy is a prime example of this. Businessweek’s headline screamed: “It’s global warming, stupid.” Others, such as Bloomberg, have also jumped on the bandwagon. They extend this to say that global warming is man-made and that we should therefore vote for Obama who is going to do something to stop human caused global warming.

My attitude is usually one of cynicism. In a democracy all parties are usually just as good and bad as each other with only slight variations on most issues. Because of this I rarely ever give real political opinions — that is until it comes to Israel. For me, the safety and security of my brothers and sisters in Israel transcends politics.

Together with many others in the Jewish community I have watched with alarm as Iran marches closer and closer to nuclear weapon capability. There is no doubt that attacking Iran must be the last option used. We also know that an Iran with a nuclear capability will be a threat not only to Israel but also to the United States and, indeed, to the entire free world. Nonetheless, the nuclear Iran threat is of greatest danger to Israel.

At the United Nations this month, the Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said that Israel “will be eliminated.” Ayatollah Sayyid Ali Khamenei, the Iranian supreme leader and commander of the Iranian military has called Israel a “cancerous tumor,” among other derogatory and alarming names. We Jews live with the memory of a short 60 years ago when 6 million of our brethren in Europe were murdered at the hands of the Nazis.

As Jews we are again in a situation where nearly half of us live in a relatively small area known as Israel. Needless to say, Israel cannot risk allowing a sworn enemy who has vowed to eliminate them to gain the means to do so. But Israel as a country seems to be unable to stop Iran on its own. It needs help from its strongest and closest ally, America.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made it clear at the United Nations that based on known information (from the IAEA) Iran will be just weeks away from being able to create a nuclear bomb by next summer, the latest. Clearly, the decision whether to defend Israel and stop Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon will fall to the next U.S. administration.

Here is where the responsibility of U.S. Jews comes in. There are many issues in this upcoming election, yet I submit that as Jews there is no issue more important than the Iranian threat towards Israel. Thus, we must block out all of the noise — to use President Obama’s term when referring to Israeli concerns about Iran — and focus on which presidential choice will more effectively deal with Iran and thus protect Israel. This is literally a life and death choice for millions of Jews in Israel.

Four years ago, I, together with thousands of other people, went to Invesco Field to listen to Barack Obama accept the Democratic Party’s nomination for president of the United States. Indeed, it was a historic moment and I wanted to be part of it. I admit to have been swept up, to a small extent, in Obamamania. I believed that the very fact that a person such as Barack Obama could become president would give the average American hope and inspiration – something that was much needed during those tough economic times.

In his acceptance speach this year we saw a chastened President Obama. After all the lofty promises he made in 2008, he has come face to face over the last four years with the harsh reality of what is possible. Yet he continues to say that he can change it all, all he needs is more time. It seems that he has not learned the most important lesson of all — human limitation.

In fact, the Torah warns us against saying: “My power and the strength of my hand created this success” (Deuteronomy 8:17). Acknowledgement must go to a power higher.

There is a biblical law stating that that, upon settling in the Land of Israel, the Israelites were commanded: Take of the first fruit to bud on a tree and put them into a basket and bring it to the House of God (Deuteronomy 26:1-2). The idea here is that although the fruit came about through the work of the farmer, divine help is also a part of the equation. This is acknowledged through bringing the first fruit to the Temple in Jerusalem.

“The Church has no special expertise in the technicalities of public policy,” said Weigel, who continued by chastising a bishops’ conference committee for publicly rejecting on religious grounds the federal budget proposed by Republican Vice-President nominee Paul Ryan.

However, it is increasingly clear that the bishops who now dominate the U.S. Bishops’ Conference bring a new corporate face and voice to the nation’s “public square.” These bishops have trivialized the social justice issues of poverty, immigration, war, racism, the treatment of women, capitalism and labor, health care, education, and human freedom.

Things are rarely as they seem, perhaps especially when religion and politics are involved. At least that’s what’s continually occurred to me as I have reflected during this “Fortnight for Freedom” which U.S. bishops have asked American Catholics to participate in June 21 through the Fourth of July.

The fortnight of “study, prayer and reflection,” supposedly flowing from Pope Benedict XVI’s speech about religious liberty to American Bishops visiting Rome earlier this year, was more immediately caused by some bishops’ sense of the need for a dramatic response to the recent Health and Human Services directive that Catholic institutions such as hospitals and universities must include coverage for contraception in their insurance plans. I say “supposedly” about the Pope’s exhortation because I speculate, without any evidence, that it was in part or even largely written by the small group of bishops and their lay associates that later issued “Our First, Most Cherished Freedom.” For this lengthy “Statement on Religious Liberty” was not the work of the entire body of U.S. bishops, though they later approved it, but of a committee of episcopal higher-ups, including Philadelphia’s Archbishop Charles Chaput and some nationally prominent and politically conservative lay advisers. It should, of course, be noted that Benedict himself has indeed long been concerned about threats to religious liberty, whether for Christians in places like Iraq, Egypt and China, or for those in the increasingly secularized countries of the modern West.

In this country, the issue of religious liberty – that is, the free exercise of religion for individuals and for religious institutions – has also long been a matter of serious concern. That is why it has been debated and adjudicated throughout our nation’s history. And why the Catholic bishops are today rightly concerned about possible government encroachments on that free exercise.

Where is your moral compass pointing? What are your social values? Hark will explore faith, morals, ethics and character at the intersection of religion ethics, culture, politics, media, science, education, economics and philosophy. At times this blog will alert readers to breaking news and trends. At times it will attempt to look more deeply into intriguing subjects. Hark means to listen attentively, and we will, as readers talk back to the news.